There was icicle-shaped christmas lights hanging around the windows, and I wondered how people could think those looked like the real thing. We were in California, hot and summerlike, and I was on my way to see him. And there was icicle lights around his windows. I should have taken this as a sign. I did not. I pushed the small doorbell, with the red-and white name label pasted under it.

It took a while before he opened the door. I almost turned back, because he was not there, or maybe because there was icicle-lights around his windows. He opened though, in his bathrobe, half-opened on his hairy beer belly, and whatdoyouwant-ed me. I wanted to turn back, and run away, throwing my faded bouquet (6.99 at the local 7/11) in the nearest plastic wastebasket, go back to my car and cry.`

He suspiciously eyed me, trying to remember if he actually knew me. Was I the girl he had served beer the day before, the one that thought he was cute?

-"Who are you?" he asked finally, putting an end to the uneasy silence. "Do I know you?" His voice was raspy, unreconizable, and I sighed.

Turn back, a voice shouted in the very back of my head, as I stared at the christmas lights. They twinkled merrily. I wanted to tell him about the memories we had shared, the things we had done together, and remember-the-camping-trip? I couldn't.

I stared at the bulky, hairy, dull-eyed man in front of me. That wasn't him, that wasn't Matt I had obssessed over for over two years the summer when I was seventeen.

-"You hated those." I said, pointing to the shiny icicles. "They're so fake-looking."

I turned back, leaving a puzzled Matt in the doorway, walked to my car, unlocked the door with the shiny metal key.

Then I sat down and cried.

© Rianne 2000